Duo built first tractor in 1901

April 08, 2008

Charles Hart and Charles Parr built their first tractor in 1901. It consisted of a two-cylinder horizontal gas engine with a nine-inch bore and 13-inch stroke. It produced about 17 HP on the drawbar and 30 on the belt. To develop smooth power a thousand pound flywheel was attached to the left hand side of the crankshaft. The model 30-60 was introduced in 1907. The chassis had the appearance of a steam engine with large steel driving wheels. The steering was by a chain winding on a shaft connected to the steering wheel. A large oil-cooling tank was mounted on the front and oil circulated by a centrifugal pump. It was started with gasoline and operated on kerosene. The engine and the tractor operator were both protected under a large canopy. The 30-60 had one forward gear with a speed of 2.3 MPH, and a reverse gear. The 30-60 engine was also a two-cylinder horizontal, with a rated speed of 300 RPM. By the standards of today, there are few engines that idle that slow, let alone operate on either drawbar or pulley. The engine carried a 10-inch bore and a 15-inch stroke. The tractor weighed over ten tons. The 30-60 was dubbed "Old Reliable" because it was very popular with threshermen, farmers, and also for road construction. The American Thresherman Magazine would write of the 30-60, the 18-ton 40-80, and the largest of the Hart-Parr, a 60-100 that weighed 26 tons and could pull a 14-bottom plow. It was the 30-60 that gained the widest acceptance and was manufactured from 1907 until 1918. South Dakota, by 1920, was ranked seventh in number of tractors on farms, leading all states was Illinois with 23,102, followed by Iowa with 20,270. South Dakota recorded 12,939. Tractor history shows that Hart-Parr was the first company to build an internal combustion or gas engine powered tractor by factory production methods. This production was only about 200 per year at first, but by 1912 the company was building about 900 a year. This production was sufficient to rank Hart-Parr third among tractor companies. The 30-60 was featured as one of twelve tractors models in Successful Farming (August 1990) that set a standard in their time of tractor development. In 1925, Hart-Parr promoted a trainload sale of their popular 16-30 Model E by inviting 150 Illinois farmers who had purchased a Hart Parr tractor, to the factory in Charles City, Iowa. They were given a tour and then a train of 36 carloads of tractors, with the new owners in Pullman Sleepers, left for Illinois. It was the first shipment of the new model east of the Mississippi River. A few weeks later, a trainload of 30 cars left for the east, mostly to Ohio, with new Hart-Parr tractors. This was a successful sales promotion, when most industry analysts thought it could not be done. Written by Delmer Dooley, an agricultural engineer, former high school ag teacher (Platte), an expert on vintage tractors and a farmer, the author lives with his wife on his parent's homestead farm near Ramona in Lake County.